Sunita Devi, a domestic worker, came up with the idea of petitioning the president after media reports showed the rape victim’s family in distress following the verdict on Saturday. Shown, front pages of Indian newspapers detailing the verdict.

Pinki Kumari, an 11-year-old schoolgirl and part-time rag-picker, is the youngest of 40 slum dwellers to sign a petition demanding harsher penalties for minors who commit crimes in India.

The petition – addressed to the Indian president – was drafted on Sunday by a group of sweepers and domestic workers in Noida, a city on the outskirts of New Delhi, a day after a juvenile court sentenced an 18-year-old to three years in a reformatory for gang-raping and murdering a 22-year-old physiotherapy student in the Indian capital in December.

“He should have been sentenced to death,” Pinki, the eldest child of a 30-year-old sweeper, said in a telephone interview Sunday. “I would ask for the same if my brothers ever commit such a horrific crime,” she added, referring to her siblings whom she said were aged nine and six.

India’s juvenile justice laws have been under the scanner in recent weeks, with many activists and women’s rights groups arguing that the law is too lenient for those being prosecuted for crimes including murder and rape. The maximum punishment for such crimes is three years’ confinement in a reformatory, as opposed to the death sentence in cases where an adult is found guilty of murder or rape.

Critics of the law, including the family of the rape victim, say a three-year sentence trivializes the brutal rape in which five adults and the teen – who was 17 years old at the time of the attack – sexually assaulted the young woman using an iron rod. Human rights groups, on the other hand, argue that efforts should focus on rehabilitating minors found to be in conflict with law, rather than on punishments and retribution.

In the wake of the assault, attempts were made to overhaul India’s juvenile laws, with several citizens filing legal petitions seeking to lower the age of a minor from 18 to 16. India’s Supreme Court has rejected eight such petitions and is still deliberating over another, which demands a minor be tried in juvenile court according to his or her “mental and intellectual maturity,” rather than being tried according to their age.

But a government-formed committee, which recommended changes to Indian laws to strengthen women’s safety, was not in favor of lowering the age limit for juveniles or introducing stricter punishments for minors who commit crime.

Domestic worker Sunita Devi, who came up with the idea of the petitioning the president, says she is not in favor of lowering the age for minors. Nor does the 35-year-old advocate that courts assess the intellectual capability of a minor.

“All we want is that punishments be raised under the law, especially for ghastly crimes like rape and murder. Why is that so tough to do that?” asked Ms. Devi who is from Bihar, a state in eastern India and left school aged 14.

A mother to three daughters, Ms. Devi says she was inspired to challenge India’s juvenile law after television reports showed the young woman’s family in distress following the verdict on Saturday.

“My heart ached for the mother of the young woman. She will watch this man – the man who raped and killed her daughter – roam the roads freely in three years’ time,” said Ms. Devi.

So, on Sunday, after pondering how she could help, Ms. Devi sought advice from Pinki’s father, a 30-year-old male sweeper, and a 32-year-old house cleaner friend. With their help, Ms. Devi worded the petition in Hindi, and wrote it down on an A4-size paper borrowed from a nearby printing store.

Next, Ms. Devi says, she went from door-to-door in her slum – home to roughly 60 families – requesting residents, many of whom she says are semi-literate, to sign the petition. For those unable to write, Ms. Devi carried an ink pad, also borrowed from the printing store, for them to leave a thumb impression on the petition.

Most signatories interviewed by India Real Time said they supported the petition out of sympathy for the victim’s family. A few others said they believed harsher punishments for minors would deter poorer children from indulging in criminal activities.

“We read about so many poor children going astray,” said Ramesh, a rickshaw-puller who goes by one name. “I signed the petition thinking it’s in their best interests.”

In 2012, Indian police charged 27,936 minors for their alleged involvement in crimes ranging from murder to rioting, according to data released by India’s National Crime Records Bureau. Nearly 80% of these minors belonged to families earning less than 50,000 rupees a year, according to a report in the New Indian Express.

The juvenile in the gang rape in December, too, hailed from a poor family of agricultural workers in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, The Indian Express, which carried an interview with his mother, reported.

Mr. Ramesh, 42, said that “stricter punishments will discourage poor children from falling into this trap.”

Ms. Devi’s petition – though limited in terms of reach — has also been well-received by her employers, many of whom are professionals in upscale colonies near the slum.

“I was touched when I heard about it,” said Soniyya Singh, a 37-year-old banker, who employs Ms. Devi on a part-time basis. Ms. Singh says she is likely to sign the petition when Ms. Devi arrives for work on Monday. “I’m also going to ask my friends to,” she added.

Anirudh Sharma, a dentist who employs Ms. Devi as a dishwasher, said he was not in favor of signing the petition because he supported rehabilitation rather than punishment for youngsters. But he applauded efforts made by slum dwellers.

It is unclear how much support Ms. Devi’s petition will draw, or whether it will have any impact in changing the country’s laws. But Ms. Devi plans to submit the petition by the end of the coming week and hopes to add at least 200 more signatories by then from among residents in neighboring slums and friends of her employers.

An official at the president’s office said he had no knowledge of the petition. He declined to comment on whether President Pranab Mukherjee would even consider it for review when submitted.

“I don’t know if this will even make a difference,” Ms. Devi says. “But at least I can say I tried.”

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India Real Time offers analysis and insights into the broad range of developments in business, markets, the economy, politics, culture, sports, and entertainment that take place every single day in the world’s largest democracy. Regular posts from Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones Newswires reporters around the country provide a unique take on the main stories in the news, shed light on what else mattered and why, and give global readers a snapshot of what Indians have been talking about all week. You can contact the editors at indiarealtime(at)wsj(dot)com.